The ocean, like the atmosphere, is a fundamentally turbulent system. As such, intense nonlinear interactions give rise to fine-scale structures, such as eddies, fronts, jets and filaments, that are of critical importance for the ocean circulation. These features are ubiquitous, and they have been recognized as key contributors to ocean transport of properties. Their energy generally exceeds that of the mean flow by an order of magnitude or more. Mounting evidence points to intense interactions, especially in the extratropics, between the atmosphere and the ocean on the scales of ocean eddies, which are much smaller than atmospheric synoptic scales. These interactions can have an important impact on the entire troposphere, affecting the positions of jet streams and their low-frequency variability, and they are likely a key-missing element in closing the budget of Earth’s energy imbalance. Theoretical understanding of eddy dynamics, especially in terms of air-sea interactions, however, remains incomplete. This represents an acute weakness in our present understanding of coupled ocean-atmosphere dynamics and its role in shaping variability and change of Earth’s climate.

We encourage submissions of abstracts describing new research findings, from observations and numerical modeling, on ocean mesoscale eddies, including their interactions with and feedbacks from the atmosphere.

Co-chairs: Walter A Robinson, North Carolina State University Raleigh, Raleigh, NC, United States, Enrique Curchitser, Rudgers University, Rutgers Dept. of Environmental Sciences, New Brunswick, United States and Xiaopei Lin, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, China

Eastern boundary upwelling ecosystems contain the most productive fisheries in the world. This immense fish production results from upwelled nutrients that stimulate high primary and secondary production. However, the relationships between atmospheric forcing and the ecological productivity of these ecosystems are not straightforward. Variability in nutrient stoichiometry, oxygen concentrations, nutricline depth, seasonal timing of upwelling, mesoscale and submesoscale variability, onshore geostrophic flow, and subduction of underutilized nutrients below the adjacent oligotrophic water masses are all examples of processes that can obscure the relationships between the intensity of upwelling-favorable wind stress and ecosystem productivity. In this session, we welcome contributions that investigate processes that may be crucial for resolving the relationships between atmospheric forcing and primary and secondary production. The objective of the session is to improve the community’s understanding of the processes and resolutions required (in both models and observations) to accurately describe the impacts of physical and biogeochemical drivers on fish and other higher-trophic-level populations of interest. Such understanding will allow better interpretation of non-stationary empirical relationships between physical conditions and ecosystem state, and is necessary to properly project and interpret ecological impacts of climate variability and change.

Primary Chair: Ryan R Rykaczewski, University of South Carolina Columbia, Columbia, SC, United States

Co-chairs: Steven James Bograd, NOAA Pacific Grove, Pacific Grove, CA, United States, Michael Jacox, University of California-Santa Cruz, San Francisco, CA, United States and Bryan Black, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, United States

Session Description:

The purpose of this session is to discuss how researchers synthesize long-term environmental data from repositories and archives to develop new products. Mining large volumes of long-term observations is required to establish reference baselines against which the state of the environment can be assessed and offer new revelations and approaches to our current scientific understanding. Integrative data analyses that incorporate multidisciplinary and “Big Data” approaches are a powerful way to obtain insights beyond the data’s original collection purpose. A central use case involves the long-term subsurface ocean temperature and salinity observational datasets that are essential to the understanding of variability and change in the Earth's energy and water cycle, to discriminate between natural and anthropogenic drivers, and to predict future changes. Millions of ocean subsurface observations have been collected by different investigators and institutions, with a variety of quality standards. An important aspect of putting our current environment in perspective is identifying and restoring to general use these historic observations in order to extend our understanding environmental change as far back in time as possible. Data rescue is not only creating and improving access to historical data but also assuring the quality of those data. We invite scientists, resource management practitioners, and policy makers to discuss ways they are currently leveraging environmental data holdings and any issues or recommendations they have for improvements of how data are put in or accessed from large national and international databases. This session invites abstracts related to the discovery and availability of environmental data and metadata as well as improving the utility of these data though the use of various quality control techniques. The focus of the session will be on describing these diverse efforts, lessons learned, and best practices to improve integration of diverse data holdings that can then spur research that addresses innovative science and provides decision makers with actionable information.

Quantitative understanding of the causes of sea level variability and change is important for the development of improved sea level projections and forecasts and assessment of related coastal impacts. This session seeks modeling and data analyses that address causes of sea level variability and change on timescales of months to centuries, at the local, regional and global levels. Of particular interest are studies that advance understanding of the connections between the large-scale ocean circulation and coastal sea level, including how climate modes of variability project onto the coastal zone. Other topics of interest include the mass and steric contributions to sea level budgets and their underlying forcing mechanisms and dynamics involving air-sea-ice interactions, and the attribution of regional sea level change to natural and anthropogenic causes.

The meridional overturning circulation (MOC) is a key component of the global climate system, as it modulates the transport and storage of both heat and carbon. Changes in deep-ocean circulation are thought to have played a key role in past climatic transitions, such as between glacial and interglacial periods. However, reaching a quantitative understanding of the dynamics that contributed to these changes, remains a major challenge in climate research. The MOC’s response to current climate trends is also an unknown when assessing future global ocean-climate-carbon cycle interactions. Investigating how the MOC varied in the past can provide crucial information on the mechanisms and drivers of its variability, as well as on the possible impacts of future circulation changes. This multidisciplinary session will facilitate discussions between the modeling and data communities, with the aim to explore both the transient and equilibrium response of the MOC to different forcing scenarios. We welcome contributions from both proxy-based studies to reconstruct past changes, and those exploring these dynamics from a mechanistic perspective, spanning from theoretical approaches to fully-coupled numerical modeling efforts. We especially encourage combined model-data analyses, as well as studies investigating past periods that could be viewed as analogues for future climates.

Primary Chair: Alice Marzocchi, University of Chicago, Geophysical Sciences, Chicago, IL, United States

Co-chairs: Benoit Thibodeau, The University of Hong Kong, Earth Sciences and SWIMS, Hong Kong, Hong Kong, Juan Muglia, Oregon State University, College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences, Corvallis, OR, United States and Andrea Burke, University of St Andrews, St Andrews, KY16, United Kingdom

Session Description:

The ocean’s capacity to store heat and to redistribute it geographically and over depth is fundamental to understanding Earth’s climate and sea level variability and change. More than 90% of the Earth's energy imbalance and about one-third of observed global mean sea level rise are explained by ocean heat uptake. This session aims to bring together studies tracking ocean heat content and thermosteric sea level and its implications for climate and sea level variability and change, from global to regional scales. We welcome studies based on in situ and satellite observing systems, ocean or coupled reanalyses, and climate modelling as well as process studies. Studies focusing on the ocean’s role in the Earth energy imbalance, climate sensitivity and regional changes associated to natural climate modes of variability are also solicited.

The meridional overturning circulation (MOC) is a key component of the climate system because of its role in redistributing heat, salt and carbon around the globe. The tremendous growth of the MOC observing system over the past ~15 years has led to new discoveries about the spatial and temporal variability of the MOC and how it influences coastal sea level, weather, and climate. Models and observations have shown that the water masses formed in remote regions are significantly altered as they transit the South Atlantic by processes such as mixing, advection, and local air-sea interactions. These modifications may lead to changes of the MOC strength and variability, and thus of the meridional heat and freshwater transport changes. In this session, we focus on recent results gleaned from observing systems in the South Atlantic, including moored, satellite, shipboard, and Lagrangian measurements. Recent model results on the MOC in the region, are also welcome. Together these observations and modeling results can provide a comprehensive view on South Atlantic MOC (SAMOC) variability. We encourage abstract submissions on new MOC-related findings in the South Atlantic, as well as on recommendation and/or design studies for the future evolution of the SAMOC observing system.

Through its associated heat, salt, and carbon transports, the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) significantly influences the climate of the North Atlantic and surrounding areas and can even impact global climate through interactions with atmosphere on seasonal to multi-decadal timescales. Because the memory of the ocean vastly exceeds that of the atmosphere, AMOC is thought to represent the dynamical memory of the climate system, playing a major role in climate variations, hence in climate predictions, on these and even longer, i.e., centennial to millennial, timescales. Support for such a prominent role for AMOC on long time scales comes from coupled general circulation model simulations and proxy records. On shorter, i.e., intra-seasonal to decadal, timescales, measurements of transports, heat content, and other variables throughout the Atlantic Ocean have been instrumental in investigating the spatial structure, mechanisms, and impacts of AMOC variability, showing the importance of processes from the mesoscale to the basin scale. A synergy of knowledge gained from all these efforts will lead to a better understanding of AMOC.

We invite contributions from modeling and observational (both instrumental and proxy) studies, investigating AMOC variability and mechanisms as well as its role in climate predictions on various, e.g., decadal, timescales.

Primary Chair: Gokhan Danabasoglu, National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO, United States

Boundary upwelling ecosystems (BUE) are known to play a significant role for ocean productivity and regulation of regional climate variability. The strong coupling between atmospheric forcing, ocean circulation, biogeochemical cycling, and fisheries have long motivated multidisciplinary studies that are now common in BUE. These ecosystems are increasingly vulnerable to the multiple effects caused by climate change, ocean acidification, deoxygenation, harvest of marine resources and coastal development. In order to manage and predict these valuable ecosystems, new and evolving scientific approaches to the collection of information and modeling are required. In this session, we seek papers synthesizing current knowledge as well as advances in the development of new observational tools and modeling approaches for understanding the multi-faceted dynamics of BUE.

Primary Chair: Enrique N Curchitser, Rutgers University New Brunswick, Department of Environmental Sciences, New Brunswick, NJ, United States

Co-chairs: Raleigh Hood, University of Maryland and Ruben Escribano, Universidad de Concepcion, Chile

Session Description:

The global oceanic basins feature energetic boundary currents (BCs) that redistribute water, heat and salt, and exhibit a complex web of physical and biogeochemical processes along their paths. As such, BCs play a major role in regulating the global climate system. Yet monitoring the multi-space and time scales of the energetic dynamic flows of boundary currents can be complicated. These boundary currents tend to act as barriers to cross-front flow, but variability associated with multiple types of instabilities, and on a range of time and space scales, act to facilitate cross-front flow, stirring, and mixing along their paths, further complicating the study of these currents. This session seeks contributions from studies including, but not limited to, the full multi-scale variability of BCs from time and space scales that span subseasonal to multi-decadal and from turbulent to basin scales; their interaction with marginal seas, frontal processes and air-sea interaction; and their impacts on marine ecosystems. In addition, we welcome papers that discuss observational (in situ and remote), analysis, theoretical and model simulations that emphasize achievements in sustained BC monitoring, and so provide guidance for the development of a future effective and efficient monitoring network.